This invention relates to a coffee maker or tea maker (hereafter beverage maker) in which fresh water is caused to pass through a heater for being heated to brewing temperatures and is advanced into a filtering vessel in an ascending feed pipe.
In making beverages such as coffee or tea it is a desideratum to introduce the brewing water into the filtering vessels as rapidly a possible.
In known beverage makers, for heating the fresh water, continuous flow heaters of generally relatively high heat output are used. The heat output is adapted to the capacity of the beverage maker. Accordingly, in machines which are capable of delivering a relatively large quantity of cups of the beverage the heat output of the continuous flow heater is relatively high, whereas in smaller machines the continuous flow heater has a relatively low heat output. In each instance the heat output of the continuous flow heater is thus adapted to the designed capacity of the beverage maker and has a fixed constant value.
In determining the required heat output of the heater, a compromise has to be found between the heat output and the particular machine configuration which is generally predetermined by a designer. The greater the heat output of the continuous heater, the larger the external dimensions of the machine, so that frequently it is not feasible to install a continuous flow heater of very high heat output in a beverage maker of predetermined configuration.